THE SOUTHERN SPRING MACKEREL FISHERY. 
2f)3 
111 1863 tho value of the mackerel catcli, as it sold at the high price which then prevailed, was 
$5,935,525; in 1869 the mackerel caught in that year sold for $3,248,315; in 1871 the catch of mackerel 
inspected in Massachusetts amounted to $2,233,055. Tho catch that year was 259,000 barrels. Of late 
tho price of mackerel has heen greatly reduced in all our markets. The numbers caught audhronght 
to our shores have heen so great that, follow! ug the ordinary law of political economy, tho supply 
heing largo, tho price has heen reduced, and all our people have obtained lish food at very low rates. 
In 1883 this large amount of mackerel sold for $1,619,000; in 1884 the catch sold for $1,853,000, 
and in 1885 for $1,230,000 only. 
These figures prove conclusively why this hill is brought here. A very large proportion of the 
year’s catch is made in the months of Marcli, April, and May, and this hill proposes that during those 
three months there shall he no fishing for mackerel wdth purse seines at all. If this hill becomes a 
law it will reduce the catch of mackerel probably 50 per cent for the next year, and what will he tho 
result? The 50 jier cent less of fish will sell in our markets for .as much money as tho large catch of 
last year did. In other words, the American people will l)e compelled to pay to the capitalists who 
control this business in those two States as much money for one-half of tho amount of lish food as they 
paid for tho larger amount last year. That is all there is of this. We are asked here to shut up and 
control the fish on the high seas for three months in tho year in order that the price of fish food m.ay 
ho advanced from 50 to 100 per cent. That is all this hill is intended for, .and it is precisely what the 
hill will accomplish if it is enacted into a law. 
Mr. President, it has been charged here that there has heen no opposition to this hill from any 
source except from the fishmongers of New York City and other Atlantic cities. I need not say to you 
or to the Senate that the poor jjeople of this country, tho laboring men and the fiiriners of this country 
scattered broadcast over the whole land, are not organized in such .a way th.at they can come here to 
protest against the passage of this hill. Neither need I say to you, sir, that not one-tenth of 1 per 
cent of the peo])lc of tho United States who coTisume fish as .a jiortion of their daily food have 
any possible knowledge th.at any such hill .as this is before the United States Senate. You will not he 
able to m.ake any considcral)le portion of the people of this country believe for a moment that the 
Congress of tho United States can be brought to the condition where it will say to its own people and 
to its own citizens th.at they shall not go on the high seas and fish for this food, which is free to all 
the world. 
We may shut our own people out from these waters for three jnonths, but wo can not shut out 
from these w.aters tho people of our neighboring countries. We can not shut out from them the 
Cau.adian fishermen. Wo m.ay close our own ports to this food-fish and .and say th<at our people for 
three months shall not have it, and th.at for the remaining nine months of the year they sh.all pay from 
50 to 100 per cent more for the fish which they consume than they would if this hill should not pass. 
It does not seem possible to me that the Congress of tho United States should patiently consider 
such a proposition as this, for not only will this enhance tho cost to .all our people of mackerel, hut it 
will undoubtedly to a large degree increase tho cost of .all salt-water fish, of codfish, of hlnefish, aiid 
of the v.ariou8 varieties which come into our markets. Any(jne familiar with this subject knows that 
during all the summer months fresh mackerel are brought into all our ports, and that they to a large 
extent, if not entirely, control the jirice of all the fish to ho found in our markets. If mackerel are 
caught in large, quantities, of course the price goes down to all the people, and it carries with it the 
price of other kinds of fish to a certain extent. 
I can find nothing in this bill, I say, save the proposition to prohibit the fishing for three months 
in order that by doing so we m.ay greatly decrease tho catch of mackerel, and thereby increase 
the cost or tho selling price of th.at which sh.all he caught during tho other nine mouths, and that 
additional cost is to bo paid by all tho people of our country. 
Mr. Palmek. Mr. President, the Senator from New York does credit to his classic.al educ.ation 
in one respect. If I remember aright, whenever in the Iliad any of the gods or goddesses wanted to 
do anything th.at would not boar watching they always surrounded themselves with a fog. 'fhat 
seems— and I do not 8.ay it oft'ensively, for possibly the Sen.ator from New York may bo a victim of his 
own hallucination — to be the result of his efforts in this case. We get uji and dispel the fog, and in 
less than fifteen minutes the Semator has got himself, if not the Senate, enveloped in as dense a fog as 
his side of the question can demand. 
What he Avants is to obscure the real issue, it seems to me, and that is that tho Fisheries 
Committee and the men who are pushing this bill are philanthropists. No such claim has over been 
made. There is no claim of j^hilanthropy about us except on the part of the Fisheries Committee. 
